In SOTA, normally I don't do dungeons because I'm virtual directionally challenged: as soon as I move the camera around I lost all sense where I came from, where I am going to or where I have been already. So a visit to a dungeon usually ends up in me running in circles, getting nowhere, and having to restart on the world map to get out. Tonight I saw Sannio navigating the new Port Harmony Cistern and I almost fell off my chair. The ease with which he went like "now we go here" and "now we go back there" blew my mind: I never imagined that people would be able to do that in a dungeon where every passage and tunnel looks exactly the same. But maybe it's normal for people to be able to keep their sense of direction in a virtual world and I am the odd one out? How do other people experience this? If I'm not the only one having trouble with dungeons, maybe we can ask for some help for us: - an active map would help a lot! - a visual track to follow, like the railway in Graff Gem Mines, is a solution too - maybe some visual clues over doors and tunnel entrances, like different colored icons? - colored light or different wall structures in different tunnels, to give us a clue where we are?
greetings i am similar in that i often get turned around. it is actually one of the main reasons i wrote the Point of Interest lua addon. it allows me to mark corridors, hidden doors, dead ends, place direction reminders, etc. it works great for me it may work well for you too!
Moving in a dungeon is more difficult for anyone. If someone moves with ease through then he is either lucky (e.g. Lovely Wyvvit in his stream with no idea where he was going and finding the exit simply headlessly running around) or he knows the place because he helped creating it or went through it several times before. I always feel some added sense of dread in dungeons where one can´t simply run away over the edge of the map but has to navigate series of tunnels always in danger of running into a room full of enemies that follow you or make you run into yet worse enemies. But that´s part of being a dungeon... As far as I know one dev stated that they want to add maps over time to all ingame towns but not all dungeons to preserve the feeling of dread and the fear of getting lost after the next couple doors. Having a full map when first entering a dungeon would seem boring to me - rather have only that show up on the map that I personally explored myself... I don´t like railoaded games and tend to go in every direction just to see what is there... In a hostile dungeon with monsters? Who would be so considerate to have made those ingame? Well - the kobolds may use some obvious signs to lure unwanted human "guests" to a room full of traps, monsters or worse... Different enemies in different tunnels...
i get turned around and lost all the time in dungeons. Hence why i dont do alot of them either. Heck i even get turned around in Elysium when i am there to mine silver. I have gotten to a point of not looting mobs completely just so their bodies stay around a bit to remind me Ohh..you went this way already. I did the new dungeon in Port Harmony in QA and live. Took me forever to meander about to get to the end...So its not just you. Even if i been in a dungeon a million times i still can get lost. Chin up and keep trying
I also get horribly directionally lost in dungeons to the point I just won't go into any of them at all (except for a few) because we have no maps for dungeons. I just gave up even going into dungeons years ago and just ignore them (I won't even go into Player Dungeons).
@Ysold, I'm sorry to hear about you getting lost in dungeons. Obviously I was able to get around in Port Harmony Cistern because I built it, but I do know of a technique some players use that you might like. When you enter a dungeon, look for the wall torches and other lights. Some players turn them on/off to use as "breadcrumbs" to mark where they've been or want to go. Knowing they do that, I try to make sure to put in a good amount of light sources for breadcrumbing and to have only half or less turned on by default. When I make a dungeon, most of the time I'm pulling from a kit so there will be a lot of repetition. As I add in walls and tunnels, I try to add variety so every area has it's own shape. Add in props helps make areas more unique, but with all the crates so common everywhere it might still seem repetitive and I'll try to work on that. Sometimes I'll vary props by area, such as area "A" will use rug style #1 while area "B" uses rug style #2. These variations can be subtle, but my hope is there are enough differences that you have a solid feeling of going from one place to another instead of being lost and running in circles. In Port Harmony Cistern, I also added in pipes through many hallways, a cave tunnel to mix up the hallways, and a combination of big rooms and small rooms. In Bunker T, there are metal signs throughout the halls over which you can hover your mouse/cursor over and they'll tell you what sections are nearby. Aside from the techniques I use on newer scenes, some of the oldest dungeon hallways and rooms are admittedly nondescript and could use some better identifiers throughout. If players would like to suggest improvements for the worst "offenders" for dungeons that need some directional assistance, please post in the bug forums. You can simply mention a dungeon that is more confusing that most, or if you have a specific section of a dungeon you'd like to see updated then please make sure to supply the "/loc" coordinates. It's likely that almost all changes will be based on adding/updated props, and if you have specific props you'd like to see added/removed/adjusted then please add that to the report.
We don't have the tech for "fog of war" (wherein each section of an area is blocked on the in-game map, and each area is revealed one at a time as you enter it). Sorry to say that there's no plans to implement it at this time.
